A deals site has backtracked after sparking anger for what appeared to be an attempt to dilute a deal that allowed shoppers to buy a £10 Tesco voucher for £5.

Mighty Deals, which is owned by MoneyExpert.com (which frustratingly sounds similar to us, MoneySavingExpert.com, but is a completely separate and unrelated site) recently offered a deal where you pay £5 for a £10 Tesco voucher.

But our forum users who took up the deal (it was never featured in our MoneySavingExpert.com Deals Section) complain that they received an email from Mighty Deals saying that in order to get the Tesco voucher, they now have to spend an additional £5 – given to them in the form of free credit by Mighty Cash – on the site.

A representative for Mighty Deals also wrote on our forum this morning saying: "On Friday 08/05/2015 you may have received an email offering you £5 free Mighty Cash as we believe you may not be an active or engaged customer. This Mighty Cash must be used by the 15/05/2015. Failure to use the £5 mighty cash by this date may result in a full refund of your £5 purchase."

This restriction was a blow to shoppers as it appears to have been put in place after they'd bought the deal. Forum user vanilla twist says: "My £5 seems to have a minimum spend attached. Will wait for a refund instead and will not be using Mighty Deals again "

The offer originally stated that a redemption email would be sent to shoppers on 15 May and that once it was redeemed, they'd be emailed the voucher within 48 hours to use in store or at Tesco Direct checkout online.

A minimum spend was also not listed in the terms and conditions of the deal we've seen and this attempt to seemingly restrict the number of people getting the deal has left many shoppers disappointed.

Mighty Deals backtracks after we get in touch

However, when we got in touch, Mighty Deals told us customers don't need to buy anything else on its site to get the Tesco gift card, and that the communication it sent out was worded incorrectly. It has since amended the forum post to reflect this.

Deborah Shanahan, MoneySavingExpert.com assistant deals manager, says: "We've seen many complaints about Mighty Deals in the past, and while it says the wording of emails sent out in relation to the Tesco deal was incorrect, this seems to be an exercise to restrict the number of people who could get the offer by forcing them to spend an additional minimum £5 on its website.

"We were only told that this was incorrect after we'd got involved. People who followed the terms and conditions and bought this deal in good faith should not be penalised, and a minimum spend should never be imposed after the event."

Mighty Deals says individuals who broke its terms and conditions and bought the deal more than once, and households that bought the offer more than twice, will no longer get the offer at all. They will be refunded in full.

Those who bought the deal and then unsubscribed as a Mighty Deals customer will also no longer get the deal and will be refunded in full. It says refunds take five to seven days to clear.

A spokesman adds: All other customers who purchased the Tesco £10 for £5 Digital Gift Card will receive their redemption link as instructed on 15 May. There is no further obligation to purchase any deals to receive your Tesco £10 Digital Gift Card."

What does Mighty Deals say?

"Mighty Deals has sold over 100,000 High Street Deals from many of the UK's leading retailers such as Tesco, Debenhams, Currys PC World and Argos. We offer these deals to reward loyal customers and to attract new customers.

"Unfortunately a minority of customers have attempted to purchase multiples by creating multiple accounts. This makes it very difficult to offer these type of deals. For future High Street Deals please ensure you are a registered Mighty Deals customer and follow the deal terms provided."

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